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Tom Mackay

Runs Lento Agency from wherever. Sports nut. Brand strategy expert. Currently building brands between time zones.

The Weekly Rundown: Your brand is probably invisible to half your customers right now

The Rundown

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Jul 2, 2026

The Weekly Rundown: Your brand is probably invisible to half your customers right now

Also: the fantasy of the simple life, June's edit of nice things, and the Wild ad brave enough to finish "drier than a nun's..."

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
Your brand is probably invisible to half your customers right now

Opinion

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Jul 2, 2026

Your brand is probably invisible to half your customers right now

How AI quietly became the front door to discovery—and why most brands haven't walked through it yet.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
Wild Deodorant promises to make you drier than a nun’s 🫢

Campaigns

+1

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Jul 1, 2026

Wild Deodorant promises to make you drier than a nun’s 🫢

You don't always have to say it. Let the nun do it.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
The Weekly Rundown: How to find the angle your category is missing

The Rundown

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Jun 25, 2026

The Weekly Rundown: How to find the angle your category is missing

Also inside: the week Cannes stopped fearing AI, the quiet death of the monoculture, June's fonts worth licensing, and Loewe without its visionary.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
Don't Disappear: the campaign we built for the GLP-1 generation

Inspiration

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Jun 23, 2026

Don't Disappear: the campaign we built for the GLP-1 generation

Somewhere between client projects we asked ourselves what it would look like to build a real campaign from scratch — strategy to screen, zero budget, zero original footage. This is the answer.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
The Weekly Rundown: How Birkenstock made fashion come to them

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Jun 18, 2026

The Weekly Rundown: How Birkenstock made fashion come to them

Also: the GLP-1 brand the category forgot to make, how LVMH rewrote Formula 1 time from Rolex to TAG Heuer, and Apple finding a better way to talk about privacy.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
Birkenstock Playbook: How to build a brand that fashion has to come to

Deep Dive

+1

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Jun 18, 2026

Birkenstock Playbook: How to build a brand that fashion has to come to

It took a back injury and two years of my wife's patience to convert me. The brand has been making the same argument for 250 years. Turns out they were right.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
We created a brand the GLP-1 category forgot to make

Inspiration

+1

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Jun 15, 2026

We created a brand the GLP-1 category forgot to make

One in eight Americans is on a GLP-1. The brands built around them all made the same error without realising it. This quarter we built the one that didn't. Introducing Verve.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
The Weekly Rundown: How the 2026 FIFA World Cup became the biggest brand machine in history

The Rundown

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Jun 11, 2026

The Weekly Rundown: How the 2026 FIFA World Cup became the biggest brand machine in history

Also: the hyperlocal code Sardinia cracked, designing for the user who can't be polite, and Nike tearing up the football rulebook with Rip the Script.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
How the 2026 FIFA World Cup became the biggest brand machine in history

Deep Dive

+1

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Jun 11, 2026

How the 2026 FIFA World Cup became the biggest brand machine in history

FIFA expanded the tournament, reclaimed the premium, and put a sensor inside the match ball. The brands that understood what was being built stopped asking for space and started holding up the walls.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
The Weekly Rundown: The NBA playoffs are a masterclass in brand theatre

The Rundown

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Jun 4, 2026

The Weekly Rundown: The NBA playoffs are a masterclass in brand theatre

Also: why sleep has become another productivity project, the fonts actually worth licensing this month, and how Etsy is sounding human while everyone else is trying to fake it.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
The NBA playoffs are a masterclass in brand theatre

Deep Dive

+1

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Jun 4, 2026

The NBA playoffs are a masterclass in brand theatre

How did the most complained-about sport in America become its greatest entertainment product?

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
The Weekly Rundown: Stop treating UGC like an afterthought

The Rundown

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May 28, 2026

The Weekly Rundown: Stop treating UGC like an afterthought

Also: the epidemic of sameness hiding inside every brand collab you've seen this year, duck noodles and an unexpected design lesson from Thailand, and Four Seasons making public health content Gen Z actually watches.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
Your customers are your best marketers. Most brands have no idea.

Deep Dive

+1

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May 28, 2026

Your customers are your best marketers. Most brands have no idea.

How the brands pulling ahead stopped missing the content their customers were already making

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
Four Seasons turned a public health brief into something Gen Z actually want to watch

Campaigns

+1

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May 26, 2026

Four Seasons turned a public health brief into something Gen Z actually want to watch

AI-generated STI monsters and a giant baby solved a public health messaging problem that's been failing for a decade.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
The Weekly Rundown: Human taste will save your brand soul

The Rundown

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May 21, 2026

The Weekly Rundown: Human taste will save your brand soul

Also: four women who were right about something small that sold for billions, the best ad hiding inside our masculinity panic, and our monthly list of nice things worth your attention.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
McCain found the brief hiding inside our masculinity panic

Campaigns

+1

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May 20, 2026

McCain found the brief hiding inside our masculinity panic

'The Dad Joke Effect' by adam&eve\TBWA encourages fathers of pre-teen sons to keep them close through laughter and it's absolutely brilliant.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
The Weekly Rundown: How entertainment brands are winning big time

The Rundown

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May 14, 2026

The Weekly Rundown: How entertainment brands are winning big time

Also: the power couple quietly building modern luxury's infrastructure, the best brand film of the World Cup before a ball's been kicked, and the inspiration workflow that changed how our team thinks.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
How entertainment brands are winning big time

Deep Dive

+1

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May 14, 2026

How entertainment brands are winning big time

The Entertainment Index 2026 is out and it puts numbers on what most brand strategies haven't caught up with yet.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
The World Cup hasn't even started and Adidas has already won it

Campaigns

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May 12, 2026

The World Cup hasn't even started and Adidas has already won it

Fifty-six million views in five days. A five-minute film that's already entered the conversation with the greatest World Cup ads ever made.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
The Weekly Rundown: The $20 smoothie and the weaponization of wellness

The Rundown

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May 7, 2026

The Weekly Rundown: The $20 smoothie and the weaponization of wellness

Also: Blake Lively's anatomy of a slow-motion fall, Lay's figured out how to make Messi feel like your mate and how do you make something look real when the default is now fake.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
Lay's figured out how to make Messi feel like your mate

Campaigns

+1

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May 7, 2026

Lay's figured out how to make Messi feel like your mate

While every other sponsor fights for pitch-side boards, Lay's built a WhatsApp group. Ten million people joined before the tournament even started.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
The Weekly Rundown: How ASICS went from a $27M loss to beating Nike on margin

The Rundown

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Apr 30, 2026

The Weekly Rundown: How ASICS went from a $27M loss to beating Nike on margin

Also: how Rosalía turned a concert into a living gallery of Goya and Degas, the golden age of title design, and Marc Jacobs turning a bag launch into a scripted drama.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
How ASICS went from a $27M loss to beating Nike on margin

Deep Dive

+1

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Apr 29, 2026

How ASICS went from a $27M loss to beating Nike on margin

The brand that spent a decade on the clearance rack is now outrunning Nike on margin. The playbook is worth understanding.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
Marc Jacobs taps Rachel Sennott to launch Scene Bag with scripted microdrama

Campaigns

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Apr 29, 2026

Marc Jacobs taps Rachel Sennott to launch Scene Bag with scripted microdrama

The writer-actress behind Bottoms and I Love LA brings her signature register — desperate visibility-chasing, played for laughs — to the brand's first episodic content platform.

Tom Mackay
Tom Mackay
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